Exclusive: Two-thirds of UK weapons have been sold to Middle Eastern countries since 2010

Britain is now the second biggest arms dealer in the world, official government figures show – with most of the weapons fuelling deadly conflicts in the Middle East.Since 2010 Britain has also sold arms to 39 of the 51 countries ranked “not free” on the Freedom House "Freedom in the world" report, and 22 of the 30 countries on the UK Government’s own human rights watch list.A full two-thirds of UK weapons over this period were sold to Middle Eastern countries, where instability has fed into increased risk of terror threats to Britain and across the West.

Meanwhile statistics collated by UK Trade and Investment, a government body that promotes British exports abroad, show the UK has sold more arms than Russia, China, or France on average over the last 10 years. Only the United States is a bigger exporter.“The UK is one of the world’s most successful defence exporters, averaging second place in the global rankings on a rolling ten-year basis, making it Europe’s leading defence exporter in the period,” the body boasted in a report released this summer.Ministers, who must sign-off all arms export licences, say the current system is robust and that they have revoked permission to export defence equipment in the past – for example in Russia and Ukraine.But the Government has also ignored calls to stop selling weapons to repressive regimes, including Saudi Arabia, which has been accused by UN bodies of potentially committing war crimes in its military operation in Yemen against Houthi rebels.Both the European Parliament and the House of Commons International Development Committee have called for exports to the autocracy to stop, but the Government says it has not seen evidence of Saudi war crimes.

The Saudi-led coalition has bombed multiple international hospitals run by the charity Médecins Sans Frontières, as well as schools and wedding parties. Food factories have also been hit, as Yemen faces severe food shortages. Human rights groups say there is evidence civilian targets are being deliberately hit. The coalition has opened investigations into a number of incidents and has repeatedly claimed in statements that the coalition "is committed to full respect for international humanitarian law in the conduct of our operations in Yemen".A joint analysis conducted by the Independent and Campaign Against the Arms Trade found £10bn in arms licences were issued 2010-2015 to regimes designated “unfree” by Freedom House, including China, Oman, Turkmenistan and UAE.Meanwhile £7.9bn worth of arms were sold to countries on the “human rights priority countries” list, which is maintained by the Foreign Office and includes countries judged by the FCO to have “the worst, or greatest number of, human rights violations”.

Customers on this list included Saudi Arabia, which was sold bombs, missiles, and fighter jets, Israel, which was sold drone components and targeting equipment, and Bahrain, which was sold machine guns. Assault rifles and pistols were sent to the Maldives, while Turkmenistan was sold guns and ammunition.Andrew Smith of Campaign Against Arms Trade warned that the dependence of British exporters on unsavory regimes could make the UK less likely to intervene against human rights violators.“These terrible figures expose the hypocrisy at the heart of UK foreign policy. The government is always telling us that it acts to promote human rights and democracy, but it is arming and supporting some of the most repressive regimes in the world. The impact of UK arms sales is clear in Yemen, where British fighter jets and bombs have been central to the Saudi-led destruction,” he told The Independent.“These regimes aren't just buying weapons, they're also buying political support and legitimacy. How likely is the UK to act against human rights violations in these countries when it is also profiting from them?“There is no such thing as arms control in a war zone and there is no way of knowing how these weapons will be used. The fact that so many weapons were sold to Russia and Libya is a reminder that the shelf-life of weapons is often longer than the governments and situations they were sold to.”

A Government spokesperson said its approach to arms export control was “sufficiently tough”. “The Government takes its arms export control responsibilities very seriously and operates one of the most robust regimes in the world. We rigorously examine every brokering application on a pre-licensing case-by-case basis against the Consolidated EU and National Arms Export Licensing Criteria.“Export licensing requires us to consider how the equipment will be used by the end-user and risks around human rights abuses are a key part of our assessment. We consider this approach to be sufficiently tough but where there is evidence of a need for further action we have the powers to do so under existing legislation”

I expect a Government that doesn't allow sales of illegal arms to countries committing war crimes, which is what we have at the moment.

There was a time when we manufactured arms to fight wars, now we manufactor wars.

Britain has reached a cross roads in our history, we can either use our greatness to make the world a better place by removing trident and negotiating for peace or we can continue down the road of war and despair, there's only one current leader capable of putting us on the correct path and every vested interest is against him.

That will send these power hungry cretins into a frenzy, they'll flock here like a murder of crows waiting to pick its bones clean, I've never witnessed so much disruption from such pathetic specimens on a forum in my life, I don't know how much longer I can tolerate such unwarranted interference from low life attention seeking parasites.

I expect a Government that doesn't allow sales of illegal arms to countries committing war crimes, which is what we have at the moment.

There was a time when we manufactured arms to fight wars, now we manufactor wars.

Britain has reached a cross roads in our history, we can either use our greatness to make the world a better place by removing trident and negotiating for peacesurrendering totally to whoever threatens us first or we can continue down the road of war and despair, there's only one current leader capable of putting us on the correct path and every vested interest is against him.

there ya go ...fixed it

btw only one current leader...you dont mean old man hole cover corbyn do you????

_________________If at any time in 2016 I have annoyed you, pissed you off or said the wrong thing....Suck it up buttercup, cause 2017 AINT gonna be any different

There are those who's opinion I value, there are those who's opinion I neither value or scorn, and then there are those who's opinion I just ignore as insignificant...I can assure you the latter outnumber the first two combined by a whole order of magnitude

Difficile est meminisse officium paludes siccare , cum de nocte surrexeritis et asinus tuus alligators ....(It's hard to remember that the task is to drain the swamp, when you are up to your arse in alligators)

scrat wrote:There was a time when we manufactured arms to fight wars, now we manufactor wars.

Britain has reached a cross roads in our history, we can either use our greatness to make the world a better place by removing trident and negotiating for peacesurrendering totally to whoever threatens us first or we can continue down the road of war and despair, there's only one current leader capable of putting us on the correct path and every vested interest is against him.

there ya go ...fixed it

btw only one current leader...you dont mean old man hole cover corbyn do you????

Here we go the first shitehawk hovers!, don't fuck with my posts you degenerate nonentity!

scrat wrote:There was a time when we manufactured arms to fight wars, now we manufactor wars.

Britain has reached a cross roads in our history, we can either use our greatness to make the world a better place by removing trident and negotiating for peacesurrendering totally to whoever threatens us first or we can continue down the road of war and despair, there's only one current leader capable of putting us on the correct path and every vested interest is against him.

there ya go ...fixed it

btw only one current leader...you dont mean old man hole cover corbyn do you????

Here we go the first shitehawk hovers!, don't fuck with my posts you degenerate nonentity!

there ya go spend the next week...atleast down there having fun.....

you cant stand being argued against can you

and NO it wasnt "interfering with your post" fool.....it was quite open and obvious to anyone what was done, and its a valid form of commentary.....so long as you make it OBVIOUS where you (the reposter) made a change....

no your unwarrented abusive reply was sheer pique at being challenged...

when I decide to allow you out.....you get ONE (1) chance .....screw up in a similar way and i WILL ban you.....

_________________If at any time in 2016 I have annoyed you, pissed you off or said the wrong thing....Suck it up buttercup, cause 2017 AINT gonna be any different

There are those who's opinion I value, there are those who's opinion I neither value or scorn, and then there are those who's opinion I just ignore as insignificant...I can assure you the latter outnumber the first two combined by a whole order of magnitude

Difficile est meminisse officium paludes siccare , cum de nocte surrexeritis et asinus tuus alligators ....(It's hard to remember that the task is to drain the swamp, when you are up to your arse in alligators)

_________________If at any time in 2016 I have annoyed you, pissed you off or said the wrong thing....Suck it up buttercup, cause 2017 AINT gonna be any different

There are those who's opinion I value, there are those who's opinion I neither value or scorn, and then there are those who's opinion I just ignore as insignificant...I can assure you the latter outnumber the first two combined by a whole order of magnitude

Difficile est meminisse officium paludes siccare , cum de nocte surrexeritis et asinus tuus alligators ....(It's hard to remember that the task is to drain the swamp, when you are up to your arse in alligators)

sassy wrote:Exclusive: Two-thirds of UK weapons have been sold to Middle Eastern countries since 2010

Britain is now the second biggest arms dealer in the world, official government figures show – with most of the weapons fuelling deadly conflicts in the Middle East.Since 2010 Britain has also sold arms to 39 of the 51 countries ranked “not free” on the Freedom House "Freedom in the world" report, and 22 of the 30 countries on the UK Government’s own human rights watch list.A full two-thirds of UK weapons over this period were sold to Middle Eastern countries, where instability has fed into increased risk of terror threats to Britain and across the West.Meanwhile statistics collated by UK Trade and Investment, a government body that promotes British exports abroad, show the UK has sold more arms than Russia, China, or France on average over the last 10 years. Only the United States is a bigger exporter.“The UK is one of the world’s most successful defence exporters, averaging second place in the global rankings on a rolling ten-year basis,...

Over a 10 year period eh...!?

Can you tell us the figures for the 4 years from 2006-2010 under Labour govt that contributed to this 10 year period report...?

And maybe tell us how much of the exports after 2010 were actually as a result of contracts already signed off by labour govt before 2010...!?

_________________“Truth is ever to be found in the simplicity, and not in the multiplicity and confusion of things.” — Isaac Newton

'The further a society drifts from truth the more it will hate those who speak it.' — George Orwell

New research by the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) states that in the nearly six years since Mr Cameron’s election in May 2010, the UK has sold weapons to 24 of the 27 states included on its own list of “countries of humanitarian concern”.

The deals come alongside over £2bn in sales to other countries accused of abusing of human rights.

Of the countries on the list, only North Korea, Iran and Cuba have not benefited from government-issued arms licences.

Of course, this is research that you could have done on your own if you were actually wondering about the things you posted about. But since your real intention was to send other posters on a hunt for figures, and to try to tar the other side with the same wrongdoing that your side actually committed, you can go sit on your thumb.

_________________"There's no map, shows where I'm goin' ... and I can't say, just where I've been."

That will send these power hungry cretins into a frenzy, they'll flock here like a murder of crows waiting to pick its bones clean, I've never witnessed so much disruption from such pathetic specimens on a forum in my life, I don't know how much longer I can tolerate such unwarranted interference from low life attention seeking parasites.

You can always fuck off back somewhere else, except no one is speaking to you over there are they? They have their own sections where you can't post becasue you were so foul and abusive from what I can gather.

You just start on every thread becasue you came here to make a point - and it seems your fans are buying it.

I don't even have much to do with you normally, now I know to steer well clear. I've not seen one post of yours that doesn't contain crap about another poster.

_________________The soul of a gypsy, the heart of a hippy, the spirit of a fairy

New research by the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) states that in the nearly six years since Mr Cameron’s election in May 2010, the UK has sold weapons to 24 of the 27 states included on its own list of “countries of humanitarian concern”.

The deals come alongside over £2bn in sales to other countries accused of abusing of human rights.

Of the countries on the list, only North Korea, Iran and Cuba have not benefited from government-issued arms licences.

Of course, this is research that you could have done on your own if you were actually wondering about the things you posted about. But since your real intention was to send other posters on a hunt for figures, and to try to tar the other side with the same wrongdoing that your side actually committed, you can go sit on your thumb.

"...The Obama years have been a boom time for America's weapons makers. Since 2009, the United States has approved arms deals worth some $200 billion—more than under any other presidency. The deals include sending Apache helicopters to Qatar, "bunker buster" bombs and cluster munitions to Saudi Arabia, and Hellfire missiles all over the place. Predicting an increase in weapons sales fueled by the war against ISIS, an unnamed American weapons manufacturing executive told Reuters last year: "Everyone in the region is talking about building up supplies for 5 to 10 years. This is going to be a long fight. It's a huge growth area for us."

The United States currently controls more than half of the global arms market. Its top five customers are Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Australia, Iraq, and Israel. By comparison, Russia, the next biggest global weapons supplier, controls just 14 percent of the market.

Some of the factors driving the surge in American exports include a shift toward arming allies instead of putting American boots on the ground, regional threats from ISIS and Al Qaeda, and Obama's 2013 decision to relax arms export rules, a move supported with an estimated $170 million in lobbying by the defense industry. In the past week, the Obama administration announced it was considering expanding weapons sales to Vietnam and easing an arms embargo on Libya..."

Anybody who can use a search engine can debunk the above in seconds. The UK is not the second largest arms dealer in the world it is the 6th. The list is as follows:USRussiaChinaGermanyFranceUk

The UKs biggest customer is..the US.

And...

Russia is the second biggest arms exporter with 23-25 % share of the market. The UK has a tiny 4.5% which is bellow France and Germany. The article is complete nonsense. The Independent published the correct figures earlier this year.